


Decompression

by DoctorDee



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Comedy, Dinner, F/F, Minor Angst, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-10
Updated: 2015-11-10
Packaged: 2018-04-30 22:04:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,341
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5181350
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoctorDee/pseuds/DoctorDee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Shepard and Liara have a quiet dinner with each other.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Decompression

I tried to calm myself as I rode the elevator. We were supposed to just be having drinks, but neither of us actually believed that. A few quick conversations, after not seeing one another for two years, and we were just going to have a glass of beer before departing? Jane obviously wanted to continue our relationship; I felt her trembling when she kissed me on the ship. I wasn’t sure what the right thing to do about us _was_. I couldn’t leave my new duties, and Shepard threw herself into these insane fights again and again. Even with the Collectors destroyed, it was only a matter of time before the Reapers themselves came, and I knew that Jane would either kill them all, or die trying. And it was far too likely that the latter would be the case.  
  
The elevator doors opened, and I stepped out in to the corridor separating it and Jane’s cabin. _Is it really a corridor when the only entrances are a meter apart from each other? Shouldn’t it be a foyer, or – stop it Liara, you’re babbling._ Moving forward, I waved the door release open, and stepped into the lap of shipboard luxury.  
  
_Holy hell, this is nicer than the quarters Mother had on her ship_. An aquarium with five different fish swimming around in it, a full display cabinet, and enough open space to house about twenty crewers on a normal warship, it was unbelievably opulent. As nice as it was, though, it didn’t have the most important part. Shepard.  
  
I looked around the room, even checking the bathroom, but she wasn’t here. Setting my present for her down on the computer table, I turned around to ask the ship’s VI for help, when the door slid open. Jane was standing there, with a covered tray in her hands.  
  
“Sorry, Liara, I thought you’d be touring the ship for a while longer. I was just getting dinner for us from the mess hall." She was wearing her usual outfit of a long-sleeved tunic and pants. She stepped past me, down the stairs to bedroom part of the cabin.  
  
“Um, no, I got done faster than I thought. What’s with the food? I thought we were just having drinks?”  
  
“Well, there’s a lot of stuff we need to catch up on, and it is late. I figured dinner would be better than just a few drinks.” _Just how much does she want to talk about?_ I followed her down the steps, and sat on the couch as she fussed over the meal.  
  
“Alright, I guess. Oh, I saw Joker on the main deck. He asked if we were going to recreate some scenes from a vid called Vaenia.” I managed to keep my face calm as Shepard massaged her forehead.  
  
“Of course he did.” I remembered how shocked I’d been at the intensity of the sex scenes in the vid. Of course Joker would be interested in seeing it happen in real life.  
  
“Anyway, what meal is this? It looks like Terran food.”  
  
“Ah,” Jane leaned over, pointing out each dish as she listed them off. “That’s pork loin with an apricot glaze, that’s scalloped potatoes, that’s French bread, and that’s roasted vegetables, from all over the galaxy. One of the few benefits of Cerberus is that there aren’t any bean-counters writing nasty memos about how much you spend on food.” The food smelled heavenly, and a clenching in my stomach reminded me of how long it had been since I’d last eaten, and of how much energy I’d burned fighting the former Shadow Broker. I sat down at one end of the curved couch, and Jane slid onto the other side, scooting up next to me.  
  
“Tch, forgot something.” Shepard slid back out, and crossed over to a nightstand by her bed. Opening the drawer, she took out about eight bottles of pills and sat back down.  
  
“Medication, to manage the after effects of coming back to life,” she said in way of explanation, seeing my look of concern.  
  
“How serious is it? The files I received on the Lazarus Project indicated everything was fine.”  
  
“Like I said, nothing too serious. A few pills to keep my body from rejecting the cybernetics and xenografts, a few pills to manage the side-effects of _those_ , and a low-level painkiller to manage the stiffness in my shoulder. Nothing I need to survive, it all just makes life more pleasant.” I narrowed my eyes. Jane sounded confident, but she couldn’t keep looking at me, instead pretending that her meal required her full attention.  
  
“ _How_ much more pleasant?” Shepard turned her head and coughed.  
  
“Well, um, I’d be in a hospital bed.” I stood up to scream at her, but Jane quickly blurted out the rest. “Don’t worry, Liara, don’t worry. Most of these pills will be gone in the year, and what’s left won’t be that important. I’ll be fine, just need to wait for my body to heal.” I frowned, but nodded, making a note to check with Dr. Chakwas before I left the ship. I sighed and sat back down, looking down at my plate.  
  
“All right, then. I just wish I’d known about it.” I cast about for something else to talk about before taking my first bite of the meat. My eyes fluttered at the sweet taste of the sauce combined with the richness of the meat. Jane smiled at my expression.  
  
“Good, right? Had this a couple of years ago when Captain Anderson took me to some formal event. Liked it ever since.”  
  
“I can see why. It seems very filling.” Conversation over, we settled down to eat, just enjoying each other’s company.  
  
Half an hour later we had finished dinner, and were idly sipping champagne and leaning against each other. I’d draped Shepard’s arm across me and was relaxing against her side. I sat upright as I remembered my gift to her. Standing, I dragged her up too and crossed over to her computer desk.  
  
“Shepard, I have a surprise for you,” I said, handing her my present. She looked down at her old dog tags blankly. She reached out and took it from me.  
  
“Never thought I’d see these again. Couldn’t find them when I went to the crash site.” Jane sat down in her chair, and just stared at her tags for a while. I stepped behind her, and rubbed her shoulders through her thick tunic. After a while, she stirred, and started speaking again.  
  
“I’m not the same woman who died with the _Normandy_ , Liara. Not really. I’ve been through so much since then; I don’t really think I can keep calling myself Commander Jane Shepard of the SA.” I frowned, and reached down to hug her tightly.  
  
“You are the same, Jane. I can look into your eyes, and I see the same caring woman in there that I love.” Shepard craned her neck up to look at me, and I made sure to look into her eyes and smile. She gave a half-hearted smile, before dropping her head back down.  
  
“I’m so tired Liara. Not just physically, but mentally too. So many people are counting on me, and I can’t keep them all alive. Kaidan on Virmire, Jacob on the Collector base, and I know more people are going to die before it’s over. There’s just so much I need to stay on top of, and I don’t know how long I can keep it up. I need a rest, just let someone else take care of everything.” I hugged her tighter, and whispered into her ear.  
  
“You can stay here as long as you like, Jane. We can call the Council; have them send a Spectre to handle any loose ends.” She shook her head.  
  
“That sounds nice, very nice. But I’ve got something to take care of in Batarian space. I’ll wrap that up, give the SR-2 to the Citadel, and then come back to you. We can rest for a while. That sounds nice, very nice.” She stood up and hugged me back. I rested my head on her breast, and listened to her heartbeat. We spent a while reaffirming ourselves in each other’s company.  
  
After a while, she pulled back and smiled at me. “Sorry for laying all of this on you. Wasn’t what I had in mind when I invited you over.” I smiled and shook my head.  
  
“No, no, it’s fine, Jane. I’m just glad to get to spend time with you again.” She gave a smile again, a real one this time, and led me down to her bed, holding my hand all the while. To my disappointment, she just sat on the edge, instead of starting to take her tunic off. _Come on Jane, I’ve been waiting two and a half years for you_. I slid onto the bed next to her, and guided her head down into my lap, smoothing out my dress as I did so.  
  
“So onto a happier subject, umm… I know. I saw that they’re making a vid of us fighting Saren.” I smiled. I’d seen spots for _Citadel_ for the past few weeks, and had declined a request for an interview from the makers of it.  
  
“Yes, I’ve seen a few ads for it as well. I also notice the camera seems to add a few cup sizes for you.” Jane snorted.  
  
“I noticed that too. Funny, but I don’t remember my armor being quite so form-fitting. Or that I didn’t wear a helmet to let my long hair dramatically billow through the breeze. Still, it is rather flattering. I sure didn’t think my name would ever end up in the news growing up in the Chicago slums. Kind of makes me feel warm inside, knowing people are going to be watching someone who looks like me on the big screen.”  
  
“They’ll be doing more than _watching_ you, Jane.” At her puzzled look, I raised an eyebrow. “You don’t know?” She shook her head.  
  
“Know what”? I started giggling, only calming down after a minute, as Jane pretended to be impatient with me.  
  
“A few months ago, on Illium, I saw a little girl begging her mother to buy her a Commander Shepard cuddleplush.” I giggled again, watching her dark cheeks flush. “It looked a lot like you, too. Same black hair, same brown skin, and she _really_ wanted it. Just think Jane. Millions of little children across the galaxy are going to sleep hugging a thirty centimeter high stuffed version of you.” I laughed as Jane buried her face in her hands.  
  
“Oh God. Oh God. And here I was just now talking about how badass I felt,” she inhaled sharply, and shot me a glance. “Joker can never know about those, understand me, Liara? Not even a hint. Otherwise I’ll wake up one day to find them strewn all over the ship.” Chuckling, I nodded my agreement, while making a note to buy one for her birthday.  
  
“Okay, okay, something less embarrassing. Did you know there’s porn of you and Tali?” Jane screamed into her hand, while I almost doubled over in laughter at her betrayed expression. “I saw one vid where you had bent her over and-“ Shepard cut me off by slapping my shoulder.  
  
“No,no,no,no. I don’t need to hear the details. God, especially if I start thinking of them the next time I’m down in engineering. Why would you tell me that?”  
  
“Well, you do look unbelievably cute when you’re flustered.”  
  
“Same to you, Liara. Remember when I kissed you in front of everybody at the dinner after Sovereign was defeated? You squeaked pretty loudly then, too.” My cheeks grew warm at the memory of that, and the wolf-whistle Joker had given at seeing us. And the pictures of us on the celebrity-zines the next day. I collapsed back onto the bed, and Shepard crawled up next to me.  
  
“All right, so we both look cute when we’re embarrassed. Oh, speaking of looking cute, I have an idea for something for us to do in this bed.” Seeing her intrigued expression, I continued on.  
  
“I was thinking I could order some wigs, and some blue body paint for you, and some brown body paint for me, and we could switch up a little bit.” Seeing her smile, I expanded on my thought. “I could be the beautiful, heroic human commander, and you could be the innocent, love-struck asari.”  
  
“Love-struck? Yeah, I like the sound of that.” Jane leaned in to kiss me, and I ran a hand up her side, as we luxuriated in each other. Breaking our kiss, I sat up to work the dress off my shoulders, baring my breasts for Shepard to see. Smiling, she reached up to cup one in her hand.  
  
“Why, Dr. T’soni, are you trying to seduce me?” I rolled my eyes before sliding the rest of the way out of the dress. Jane started taking her tunic off, but paused half-way through to let out a very long yawn. Mock scowling, I punched her shoulder.  
  
“ _Shepard!_ It’s been,” _oh no_ , “over two years,” _By the goddess, not now_ , “since we had sex,” _don’t do it, Liara_ , “and you can’t stay awaakkkeee-“ _Dammit T’soni!_ I cut myself off, but not before an even longer yawn had erupted from me. I collapsed back onto the bed, cradling my head, while Jane laughed at me.  
  
“Okay, Liara, it’s been a long day. Why don’t we just spend tonight sleeping? There’ll be time enough for sex later.” Closing my eyes, I nodded my head. I heard Jane standing up to get the rest of her clothes off, before nudging me off the bed so that we could get under the covers.  
  
We looked at each other, as the lights faded in the room. Reaching out, she wrapped me in a hug and held me close as we drifted off to sleep.  
  
“I love you, Jane.”  
  
“I love you too, Liara.”


End file.
